


he ain't gonna beat him

by Doggoos



Category: Half-Life
Genre: Bets & Wagers, Cuddling & Snuggling, M/M, Movie Night, Mute Gordon Freeman, Pre-Relationship, Short & Sweet, Sleepy Cuddles, Vents, based off that phone call in black mesa, hopefully, if you get b99 vibes i'm doing something right
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-17
Updated: 2020-12-17
Packaged: 2021-03-11 05:28:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,006
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28020018
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Doggoos/pseuds/Doggoos
Summary: Gordon and Barney have a simple bet: whoever can unlock Kleiner's office for him the most can take the other out for a day of their choosing.
Relationships: Barney Calhoun & Gordon Freeman, Barney Calhoun/Gordon Freeman
Comments: 11
Kudos: 62





	he ain't gonna beat him

**Author's Note:**

> hello half life fandom !! i have several hl fics in the works right now, but i had this idea after watching a playthrough of black mesa and wrote most of it in one sitting. idk if the others will ever see the light of day, but i wanted to post something bc i think this fandom is neat :)
> 
> disclaimer about the ocs mentioned in the tags: they're just the characters mentioned in passing in black mesa and, afaik, they are never properly expanded on. i didn't expand on them either, so they're basically just named npcs that appear a few times in the first 400ish words
> 
> if you don't know the phone call i keep talking about (the scene the entire fic is based on), you can see the full thing [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lyLSDmPA91U&ab_channel=DJsquare3)
> 
> also sorry if people have already done the same thing as me! i haven't been reading much fic lately, i just really like this scene :)

“So… I think that guy’s been cooped up in that lab for too long,” Barney said into the phone, absentmindedly fingering a piece of paper on his desk. “That’s my official stance on this.”

He was calling to hopefully settle some sort of disagreement between one of his guards and one of the scientists. If he could talk to Miller before Doctor Horn could, it would hopefully save them all a lot of headaches later down the line. He wanted Sisk to know he had his back, after all.

“He’s got the cabin fever, and he’s owning it like a boss.” Barney sighed. In a way, he kinda felt bad for Horn. It was obvious he was going through something, but if he was going to baselessly accuse his friends of weird crimes—is stealing a slice of pizza even a crime? Not that Sisk would do it anyway, of course—then Barney would have to intervene. Maybe Black Mesa would offer some sort of therapy sessions if they knew how some of the scientists were acting…

Just as Barney was about to finish the call respectfully, the door to his office opened. He turned around and found Officer Sezen, another one the guards, standing in the doorframe, grinning mischievously. Barney raised an eyebrow, wondering if he should hang up on Miller before Sezen could get started.

“Hey, Calhoun,” Sezen grinned, “Guess who just locked himself out of his office again?”

Barney chuckled, a smile pulling at his lips. “Ohhh, not Kleiner?” This would probably the fourth time this week he’d done this, and Barney was starting to wonder if he was doing it on purpose.

“Yup! And guess who’s in the vents?” Sezen raised an eyebrow pointedly, like he knew exactly how Barney was going to respond. And, to be fair, he probably did. This was far from the first time something like this had happened.

Barney shot up from his seat as soon as he’d processed the officer’s words. The chair he had been sat on flew halfway across the room, rattling as it hit the concrete. The papers he had been holding fluttered to the ground along with the telephone receiver. Barney broke off into a sprint, conversation with Miller completely forgotten, leaving Sezen alone in the office.

Sezen followed Barney to the door, watching him with a smile on his face. “He’s already halfway there!” he shouted at Barney’s retreating figure. “You’re not gonna beat him!”

Barney looked over his shoulder briefly. “ _Bullshit!_ ” he yelled back, voice echoing through the corridor, before turning a corner and disappearing from Sezen’s sight.

Sezen turned back to face Barney’s mess of a desk. The phone was hanging over the edge, swinging lightly from the force at which it was dropped. Smiling, Sezen picked the phone up. He wasn’t sure who was on the other end, but they probably deserved an explanation. “He ain’t gonna beat him,” he said into the receiver, then hung up.

* * *

Barney was planning the route he would have to take to beat Gordon to Kleiner’s lab. He had no clue where the man had started his journey from, but Barney had spent the last few months learning the quickest ways around Sector C using only the vents, and he was pretty confident he’d figured out the best way there from anywhere in the Sector.

Not slowing down, Barney activated the radio strapped to his chest. “Attention all personnel, if anyone is currently near Lab 1-D, could you please open the vent in there as soon as possible,” he asked, breathing heavily. “It’s an _emergency_ ,” he added, for good measure.

If he was lucky, one of the more experienced guards would be patrolling down there and would know exactly what was going on. If it was one of the new hires… Well, at least Barney would be able to determine how good they were at following instructions under pressure.

His radio crackled to life. “On it, Calhoun!” a voice said, followed by a laugh. That was Otis, then. He could be trusted. He knew what rested on Barney’s speed.

Barney didn’t reply, instead just picked up his pace. A few scientists he passed tried to inquire about where he was running to, but Barney didn’t have time to respond. A left here, another left, then a right… and he was in the first lab corridor. He pushed through Lab 1-D’s door with practised ease, startling the poor scientist trying to do their work.

“Oh, I do wish you two would calm down…” they muttered to themselves, setting their glasses back on their face.

The vent cover had been dutifully removed by Otis, who was standing against the wall. He smiled at Barney as he ran in. “She’s all ready for ya, Calhoun!” he said, smiling, gesturing at the open vent.

Jumping up on to the lab counter, Barney pulled himself into the vent, wriggling the rest of his body in. “I owe ya one, Otis!” he shouted back at the guard.

“You’re damn right you do!” Otis responded, lifting the grate up to start screwing it back on while Barney started shuffling towards Kleiner’s office. “Good luck!”

* * *

He’d saved a lot of time by going to Lab 1-D first; it was one of the shortest routes to Kleiner’s. He could only hope that Gordon had picked a worse place to start from.

They had a bet going, he and Gordon, about who could help Kleiner into his office more. It had been going on for nearly six months now, and the deadline was tomorrow. This would probably be their last chance to get a point, unless Kleiner decided to be spectacularly forgetful two times in the same day.

Gordon had helped Kleiner 12 times in the last six months, while Barney was slightly ahead with a score of 13. If the scores were further apart, Barney might not have abandoned his phone call to Miller so abruptly (well, he probably would have; he loved his and Gordon’s races through the vents, but that was the excuse he would use if Miller asked). If Gordon got there first the competition would probably have to run for another month or so, and Barney did not want that to happen.

There wasn’t that much on the line, to be honest. It was more the principle of the thing. And it was a way to get out of work and break up the monotony of the day. The stakes were simple: if Barney won, he and Gordon would have a 24-hour movie marathon together, and if Gordon won, they would go paintballing together. The only problems, however, were that Barney knew exactly what type of movies pushed Gordon’s buttons (sci-fi based on completely unrealistic science ( _especially_ physics)), and Gordon was _unnaturally_ good at paintball (half the guards were in awe of his aim).

To be frank, Barney was very much looking forward to a movie marathon with Gordon. He secretly loved seeing the scientist getting passionate about things and getting him to rant about science was always very rewarding. Even if Barney didn’t understand half the words he was using, he always genuinely enjoyed watching the man’s hands go a mile a minute as Gordon explained exactly _why_ that particular plot point made absolutely _no sense_ whatsoever. He had spent the last few weeks picking out the most unrealistic, impractical movies he owned, and renting the ones he didn’t have in his collection.

And, if he was being honest, Barney was very much looking forward to spending an entire night on the same couch as Gordon. Maybe he’d finally get the courage to put his arm round Gordon’s shoulder, or maybe Gordon could lean into Barney’s shoulder of his own volition…

Right. Vents. Kleiner. Bet.

Paintballing with Gordon wouldn’t be so bad, either. He had always wanted to see how Gordon performed in a more realistic situation than a shooting range. Even if paintballing would end up in more bruises than a nice movie night, and there were a lot fewer chances for potential cuddling, Barney couldn’t really bring himself to mind.

He couldn’t tell anyone that, of course, because it would ruin the entire point of the bet. Besides, his night in would be a lot less physically painful.

Throughout his many vent reconnaissance missions, Barney liked to think he knew he way through the vents pretty well. He hadn’t been paying the most attention to where he was going but was pleased when he started hearing someone else dragging themselves through the ducts near him.

Turning the final corner, Barney was greeted with the sunny face of Gordon Freeman staring back at him, who grinned upon seeing him. They were in the final stretch of vent, with the opening to Kleiner’s office in the middle of space between them.

Barney put on his most charming smile, leaning on his elbow. “Oh, heya, Doc! Whatcha doin’ there?” he asked nonchalantly, with a faux sweetness.

Gordon raised an eyebrow. [Aren’t you supposed to be working?] he asked pointedly.

Barney shrugged as well as he could in the very enclosed space. “Ah, you know how it is. I can always make time to win a bet.”

Gordon narrowed his eyes. For a moment, neither of them moved, waiting for the other to do something.

It was Barney who broke the stalemate. He pushed himself up and forward, towards the opening in the floor. But he pushed himself up too high, and the back of his bulletproof vest caught on the roof of the vent. The vest snagged at his neck and his arm gave out beneath him, sending him crashing into the floor of the vent. 

This spurred Gordon into moving, and he scrambled forward towards the vent as fast as he could.

With a huff, Barney pushed himself up on to his hands and tried to beat him to the hole, but before he could move a few feet, Gordon had already fallen through it headfirst.

Kleiner had gotten used to their antics many months ago and placed a couch directly under the vent in his office to break their falls. He said he had gotten sick of checking the two of them for injuries whenever they did one of their “silly little races”, but it was said with just a tad too much concern to be believable.

Barney stuck his head through the vent opening. Gordon was laying there, grinning up at the guard. “You okay?” he asked.

[Fine,] Gordon replied. [I won this one.] He stuck his tongue out and Barney heard the implied ‘haha’.

As childish as it was, Barney stuck his tongue out in retaliation. He sniffed, faking nonchalance. “Yeah, alright, you got this point. Now move over so I can come down.”

With an exaggerated huff, Gordon pushed himself up off the couch and started scavenging Kleiner’s horribly messy desk to find his keys. Behind him, Barney dropped down on to the couch, feet first, and much more gracefully than Gordon had done. He leant back and breathed out, stretching out his muscles.

So it was a draw now, no big deal. They’d just have to decide how they wanted to proceed.

Having found Kleiner’s keys, Gordon walked over to the door and opened it. He smiled at Kleiner and handed the keys over.

“Ah, thank you, Gordon!” Kleiner said, patting the younger doctor on the shoulder. He looked over to the couch. “Ah, Barney, you’re here too! So, who won?”

“Gordon did,” Barney said, pointing at the man in question. “Not by a lot, mind.”

“Ah, that takes us up to a tie, does it not?” Kleiner asked, glancing at the whiteboard on the back wall which proudly displayed each man's current score. 

“Sure does. Guess we’ll have to extend the bet for another month or something.” Barney shrugged, leaning his head against the back of the couch.

Gordon sat down next to Barney. [I’m down.]

Kleiner shook his head, tutting. “No, no, you shouldn’t do that; it would ruin the whole premise. Why don’t you just do both?” He raised an eyebrow at the two men. “A compromise, if you will.”

“Well…” Barney looked at Gordon, who shrugged and nodded. “Yeah, why not?”

Gordon smiled. [Deal.] He stuck out a hand, which Barney shook, grinning.

* * *

That weekend, the two of them had a booking at the paintball place just outside of Black Mesa, followed by several hours’ worth of bad sci-fi movies.

As expected, Gordon absolutely thrashed Barney in paintball. The man was like a machine; creeping through the forest silently and very rarely missing a shot. Even under pressure, he managed to keep his hands steady. Barney could admit it, he was in awe. Especially since Gordon swore he never had any official training.

After they left the paintball range, significantly more bruised and achier than they had been previously, they crowded into Gordon’s tiny apartment. Barely waiting for the other to settle in, Barney dumped a bag of the most unrealistic films he could find over the floor.

Gordon ran his eyes over the titles. [I don’t even recognise half of these,] he said, giving Barney a disapproving look.

Barney raised his hands in surrender. “Hey, if I picked good films then there wouldn’t be any incentive for you to win!” He looked down at the pile of movies. “But yeah, some of these do look really shit.” He pulled out a case at random. “Fancy a nice watch of, uh… _Mac and Me_?”

Gordon narrowed his eyes at it. [More like mac and cheese... Did you just buy an ET rip-off?]

“Oh, don’t worry, I _rented_ them. Very different.” He rubbed his hands together. “Right, do you wanna start with this one?”

Gordon deflated, glancing down at everything else on the floor. [I guess we have to start somewhere…]

Barney laughed. “That’s the spirit!” He chucked the tape to Gordon. “You put that in, I’ll get the popcorn.”

* * *

Several hours and several rants from Gordon later, the two were sat with their shoulders touching on the couch. They were huddled under one of Gordon’s blankets, a half empty bowl of popcorn lying forgotten between their laps.

Barney was trying to stifle a yawn when he felt something touch his shoulder. Blinking away from the TV screen, he looked over to find Gordon slumped against his side, with his head resting on his shoulder.

Barney froze. Had Gordon fallen asleep? Granted, they had had a pretty active day, and Barney hadn’t heard a disapproving sniff from him in a while…

“You awake?” he asked quietly, not wanting to disturb him if he was asleep. God knows he didn’t get enough sleep as it was.

Gordon shuffled under their shared blanket, then nodded his head slowly against Barney’s shoulder.

Barney felt his face heat up. Great. Okay. Gordon had leant against him while he was conscious. This was fine. Just a completely platonic cuddle session on the couch, like best friends do. Cool.

He forced himself to relax. He unsquared his shoulders and leant back into the couch, careful not to dislodge Gordon. Barney looked back at the TV. There were aliens swarming Earth now—Barney didn’t know when that had happened. Last time he had checked, this was a film about time travel. He tried to focus on the plot but Gordon’s breath against his neck was a very good (and very welcome) distraction.

Barney wondered if Gordon could hear how his heart was hammering in his chest. This close, Barney could smell the cologne Gordon used, and he could feel the loose hairs from his ponytail tickling his bare neck. Should he be doing something? Was there some sort of guidebook he should have read before he decided to plan a movie marathon with the guy he had a crush on? Did Gordon want him to do something? Fuck, he was useless in situations like this.

Gordon patted Barney’s thigh to get his attention. [This film is so shit,] he said bluntly.

Barney cleared his throat, chuckling weakly. He hadn’t really been watching. “That was kinda the point,” he said. “Everyone needs to experience a few shit movies in their lifetime. How’re the scientific explanations holding up?”

[I think it would’ve been better if they hadn’t tried explaining anything at all.]

Barney barked out a slightly nervous laugh. “That bad, huh?”

Gordon didn’t answer any further than pulling the blanket further up his chest.

“Late night?” Barney asked, lowering his voice.

Freeing his hands from the blanket, Gordon signed, [More HEV suit tests.]

Barney hummed. Gordon had a big test coming up soon, one that needed the HEV suit. The administrator hadn’t bothered telling anyone the details of the test, but they knew it was potentially dangerous. Black Mesa had been keeping Gordon later and later recently, ensuring he was prepared for whatever the test could be. They’d been lucky to get the weekend off, really.

[I had fun today, though,] he said. [Haven’t had the chance to wreck someone at paintball in a few years.]

Tutting, Barney lightly hit Gordon’s forearm. “I wasn’t that bad. We can make it a thing, if you want. A way to de-stress from work, maybe?”

Gordon nodded, smiling. [I’d like that. Thank you.]

“Hey, no worries. I always like spending time with you.” When Gordon didn’t respond, Barney wondered if he’d fallen asleep. “Did you wanna go to bed?”

Gordon slowly shook his head. [Sleep on couch. With you.]

Barney’s face flushed again. He smiled to himself, trying to hide his face. “Alright. …Good night, Gord. Sleep tight.” Hesitantly, Barney put his arm around Gordon’s shoulder. When he felt Gordon relax under it, he let his eyes slip closed.

His back would probably complain in the morning, but Barney would happily take that if it meant he could sleep with Gordon’s heat at his side, even just once. For now, he was perfectly content with how he was: lying on a couch with his best friend at his side.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you very much for reading !! hope you enjoyed :)
> 
> i did want to do a second chapter set in xen when gordon finds the recording of this phone call and the memory of it is what pushes him to continue through xen and finish the job but ehh,, we'll see
> 
> i also wanted this to be more fleshed out but i'm working on,, writing less in some fics (see: my currently unpublished gordon swap fic that's like 30k,,, tell me if you wanna see that lol)
> 
> but anyway, hope you have a nice day!! :)


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